Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, the former ruler of Qatar who died on July 12, 2026 at the age of 74, will be honored in the UAE with a four-day national mourning period ordered by the country’s Presidential Court.
For the duration of the observance, flags will remain lowered at half-mast across UAE government bodies and at Emirati embassies and diplomatic posts overseas. The Presidential Court set the period to run from Sunday, July 12, through the close of Wednesday, July 15.
In its statement, the Presidential Court offered condolences to the Al Thani family, asking that the late sheikh receive God’s vast mercy and a place in Paradise, and that those he left behind be granted strength and patience in their grief.
Sheikh Hamad’s death was confirmed earlier the same day by the Amiri Diwan, Qatar’s top government authority. According to Khaleej Times, the former emir died on the morning of July 12, and funeral prayers were scheduled following Maghrib prayer at the Imam Muhammad bin Abdul Wahab Mosque, with burial to follow at Lusail Cemetery.
He led Qatar for 18 years, taking power in 1995 and stepping aside in 2013 in favor of his son, the current emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani. As The National noted, the handover was an uncommon move among Gulf hereditary rulers, carried out to secure an orderly succession. During his years in charge, Sheikh Hamad steered the small Gulf state toward becoming the world’s leading exporter of liquefied natural gas, a shift that underwrote sweeping economic and diplomatic expansion. Al Jazeera, the news network he founded in 1996, grew during that same stretch into one of the most influential media outlets globally.
The mourning decree came after several senior UAE figures publicly expressed their sympathies. Among them was UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, who addressed his message to Qatar’s emir, writing that he asked God to “grant him mercy, rest his soul in eternal peace, and bring comfort to his family during this difficult time.”
Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Ruler of Dubai, described the death as a shared bereavement, calling the late ruler “our collective loss.” The diplomatic adviser to the UAE president, Dr. Anwar Gargash, characterized Sheikh Hamad’s tenure as an “exceptional role in Qatar’s renewed renaissance.”
Qatar itself entered a matching four-day mourning period, during which the Amiri Diwan suspended operations at ministries, public authorities and government institutions beginning Monday, July 13, with staff set to return on July 19.
